DC Area Homes Still Selling Quickly

• October 25, 2010

by UrbanTurf Staff

Lydia DePillis over at Housing Complex picked out an interesting statistic from Delta Associate’s 3rd Quarter Housing Outlook for the DC area: Properties for sale in the area currently spend an average of just 61 days on the market.

Many readers in the market for a home in the District might even find this number high, lamenting that homes they find appealing fly off the market soon after being listed. But as DePillis writes, the number of days that homes are spending on the market is actually fairly low, historically speaking:

“Houses now spend an average of 61 days up for sale before getting bought, which is down 42 percent from the early 2008 peak of 104 days on market. It’s also well below the long-term average of 76 days (but still above the all-time low of 29 days).”

The days on market metric has been criticized by some, including DCHousingPrices Keith Gibbons, who has noted that real estate agents can take a listing off of the market and then list it under another MLS#, thereby skewing the accuracy of the average. In an email to UrbanTurf, Gibbons explains why inventory level is a better gauge of market health:

I’m more interested in the months inventory level – number of homes listed divided by the number sold in the prior month. If it’s more than 6 months, buyers market; 6 months, equilibrium; less than 6, advantage sellers.

For a chart that tracks the average number of days on the market over the last 15 years, see below:

This article originally published at http://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/dc_area_homes_still_selling_quickly/2603